dp - new adventures: In Bohol-Panglao with my Philippine Family

I spent another week here. Pat and I intended to do a lot of snorkeling, even tried to get the young girls to go. But again here, the weather was rainy. We went to the big city of Tagbliaran one day. Nadia and I got a massage, the girls went to a movie, and we 'shopped' at a large indoor mall, with a final stop at BQ ... that's the large grocery+ store. My massage was strange, it was more like an full body oil rub, i don't think she knew where any muscles were. But, it was ok, and what do you expect for 350php, about 7usd.

I took a few photos of Kevin's home & surroundings. The last time i was here, it was a one story home.

They are still working on additions to the house, master bedroom suite, and outdoor kitchen. And the addition of 2 guest rooms, for rent. There is the 'main foreman' living on site, and 3-4 workers that have been here for 3 years. Kevin employed them throughout the Covid pandemic ! They also helped with the Typhoon destruction rebuild that left them without power for 30 days !

The pool was there before, but a 'pool house' was added, with upgrades to the decking, and a hot tub.

Quite impressive ! I haven't introduced the sweet well trained obedient pups. This is Dash, such a sweet dog. He likes ice cubes ... if you give him one, he'll take it over to a mat on the floor, so he doesn't get the floor all wet !!!!

and Sandy, a patient 'rescue'

We finally decided to 'just go' one day for a snorkel, ... and went back to the beach where i spent so much time snorkeling for 3 winter visits. But, we got part way down into my favorite snorkel area, we got blasted with a horn and a 'guard' telling us that we were not wanted. Well that was not expected nor welcomed :( We ended up at the 'public' snorkeling area (for beginners). But we made the best of it. Pat found this Nudibranch 'egg' sack. They are beautiful .. like a red rose !

I really struggled to get any fish photos ... i guess i'm out of practice on that too ! But here are a few. Moorish Idol ... a very 'majestic' fish, with that long fin ...

and a very small Juvenile BlueRing AngelFish, that was a very elusive and quick subject.

I found this pretty green clam. This is a burrowing clam, once it finds a place to live, it stays there.

These are called Christmas Tree Worms, aptly named. If you get too close to them, they vanish inside their tube, ....poof, gone. If you wait awhile, it will slowly come back out.

There was an entire neighborhood full of them.

There were many beautiful colorful Sea Stars !

This is called a Cushion SeaStar ... for obvious reasons

Unfortunately there was a lot of algae/weeds in the sea as well; but it provides kind of a nice contrast to this one.

I caught this guy watching me with his big eyes, and Groucho Marx eye brows

My last day there we tried to go to another place to snorkel... but they wanted an Admission Fee, a Snorkeling Guide Fee, and an Environmental Fee. We went to their friend Alfred's hotel on the sea instead.

We went out to the 'drop off' and there were lots of pretty little fishes swimming on the ledge.

There were a lot of hard corals in the deep water, so not much color. Usually the soft corals are the colorful ones.

One more pretty red Sea Star

The coral in the shallows was dead and broken. The Typhoon they had damages the corals in the shallows with the strong wave action. It's sad to see.

A storm was coming in and the waves were a bit large; but we are 'professional' snorkelers ... :) ...and lasted over an hour before calling it quits. As soon as we got in, it started pouring. Thankfully we were at Alfred's so we had shelter and food :) You can see the rain on the pool !

It was a good day in spite of the weather. Alfred's place is really in sync with nature ... nicely engineered. You can tell it was a bit stormy and turblent.

My last night I wanted to take everyone out to dinner that enhanced my stay. We ate at Linaw Beach Resort .... right on the sea ... but since it was raining ... we ate inside